


Roses Grow from Bone and Blood

by Rednaelo



Category: Devil May Cry
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Hanahaki Disease, I can't believe it's not actually hanahaki, M/M, Meet-Cute, No Angst, Witchcraft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-12
Updated: 2020-08-12
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:01:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25852531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rednaelo/pseuds/Rednaelo
Summary: Nero deliberately chose a college far from home in hopes of a change of pace.  He gets a pretty drastic change one night at a house party, encountering the apparently infamous campus witch.
Relationships: Nero/V (Devil May Cry)
Comments: 11
Kudos: 73





	Roses Grow from Bone and Blood

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Imdeadweight01](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Imdeadweight01/gifts).



> HEY HI GOOD T'SEE Y'ALL AGAIN!
> 
> This is a gift for my friend and supporter, Dun, who told me that she really liked college AUs and I just wanted to write it as a thank you. So thank you, Dun! I really appreciate your support and cheerleading and enthusiasm for my work. It makes me smile and I really hope this makes you smile!
> 
> oh and **CONTENT WARNING UPFRONT: this piece does contain usage of homophobic slurs. please avoid reading if that upsets you.**
> 
> -Bec

There’s such thing as a perfect sort of drunk – entirely lucid but blissed-out – and Nero hasn’t been trying to get there, but it finds him after three red solo cups full of the house hunch punch. He knows no one here except Nico and she vanished off somewhere into the unfamiliar halls crowded full of unfamiliar people somewhere between cups one and two. But that’s fine. Nero’s keeping himself entertained without her.

The kitchen counter is cluttered with booze bottles and mixers with a constant sway of strangers shifting around it – making a mess of cup stacks and soaking the flimsy, blue paper napkins with pours that miss the mark – but next to the counter on the floor are a couple of drink coolers set side by side. No one’s getting to that ice at the moment: a shirtless, giggly blonde girl has laid her body across the coolers and her friend is currently pouring tequila into her bellybutton.

“V!” the gigglebox calls, flapping a hand eagerly at someone that Nero can’t see. “V, do a body shot off me!”

“Lay still, you gotta be still!” her friend says, also giggling while she draws a line of salt between blondie’s breasts. “You’re spilling it!”

“V, come on!” She squirms and laughs when her friend flicks her hipbone after attempting to fix the disrupted process. Nero takes another sip from his cup and smiles behind it, scanning the crowd, looking for who she’s calling for. He’s anticipating another tipsy college girl.

The person who actually approaches defies those expectations entirely. He stares down at the girl, amused, with serene and clever eyes, his own cup in hand. Over one shoulder hangs a long, black braid and his whole torso is positively covered in tattoos, plenty of them visible by the long-sleeved black crop top he’s wearing. 

“Goddamn,” Nero can’t help but say aloud. It’s lost in the gleeful roar of the party.

“Sweetheart, you know I despise tequila,” the boy – V, she called him – says in a voice that’s dreamy and warm and manages to float to Nero despite the noise on sheer, magnetic resonance alone. 

“C’mon, just one, then I’ll leave you alone, please, c’mon, I’m drunk and I love you, please?”

V laughs. His smile is broad and beautiful but Nero doesn’t catch it all, part of it hidden behind V’s fingers brushing against his lips. The girl waggles a lime wedge at him. 

“Just one,” he tells her and plucks the lime away to tuck it carefully between her teeth. The cup in his hand is entrusted to the friend with the tequila bottle.

Nero’s not the only one paying attention. Several heads have turned and there’s a bit of a hush that muffles the louder spikes of noise (and a few catcalling whoops of encouragement). Nero doesn’t take his eyes off of V and watches his elegant, tattooed hand settle gently on the girl’s side, his fingers curve along her ribs, his lips lowering to her navel. His whole mouth closes over the little puddle of tequila in her bellybutton and he makes this slurp like he doesn’t intend to waste a single drop (despite not liking it). And it’s probably that rude, messy noise that really makes Nero’s dick start paying attention.

V lifts his head and his hands wrap around her forearms, holding her steadily while he laps up the salt in one smooth line from between her breasts. She’s giggling and turning pink and her last laugh sounds like a moan. Nero’s throat is dry.

V cups her cheek when he bends to bite the lime from her. And he does it with his head tilted at the perfect angle for Nero to watch his tongue touch the wedge before his teeth close down, so carefully, but they scrape over her lips – Nero’s heart jumps when he sees it – in a deliberate bit of foreplay. Though when he pulls back with the lime, she follows him up and kisses his cheek (and misses a little and her lipstick smears on the sharp line of his jaw).

There’s cheering and clapping and Nero would probably holler too but he busies his mouth chugging down the rest of his cup.

God _damn_ ….

He doesn’t catch the whole sentence – and even after he hears it, Nero scrunches his eyebrows and frowns because did he _really_ hear that? – but someone definitely mutters something (not all that quietly) that includes, “—wasted on that fag—”.

Nero finds the guy easily but only because V finds him first. Steps right up to the semicircle of frat boys and smiles at the one who’s right in front of him.

“Do you have a problem with me?” V asks him. 

“No, no,” the guy says lightly. “Don’t have any problem with you. Just don’t get why a guy who’s clearly into dick would want to put his mouth all over Rio’s tits.” He shrugs and smiles. Thinks he’s a genius. Nero puts down his cup and gets up from his lean on the wall. The whole room…well, it isn’t quiet but people are definitely watching this confrontation more than they’re doing anything else. “Doesn’t make sense to me, is all,” the douchelord goes on to say. “Saw last time you were making out with a guy so I figured you’d rather do body shots off one of your boyfriends.”

V nods along like he’s considering the argument seriously.

“Right, I see,” he says. “I suppose that no one explained bisexuality to you, did they? Which is a terrible shame since that’s what you are.”

The guy blinks. His smile falters. Nero blinks too because this is not the direction he thought the conversation was going. One of the guy’s friends snorts an incredulous laugh.

“Dude, what the fuck, no I’m not,” is the first line of defense and Nero’s already grinning as he watches it crumble.

“Oh, it’s at least cursorily true,” V notes with an assured little nod, “seeing as how you entertained the fantasy of putting _your_ mouth on me so it’s not like the possibility never occurred to you.”

There’s laughter in the crowd. Nero hears someone say, “He’s doing—!” and another one whispers, “— _witch_ —”.

“That’s bullshit!” the idiot shouts, red-faced, and takes a lurching step forward, grabbing at V. Nero’s pushing off the wall. V holds up one finger and says,

“Stop.”

And the guy just stops. Freezes in place. He even wobbles a little bit like his momentum suddenly hit a wall and he has to keep balanced. 

“You shouldn’t be insulting me when I’m only minding my own business, enjoying myself,” V tells him. His eyes are stormy and his pretty lips are pulled away from his white teeth in a sneer. “You shouldn’t insult me at all, actually, no matter the occasion. For now, you see, you owe me for the slight.”

Then V’s hands start glowing. His tattoos light up like fissures of gold and the air in the entire house grows humid and sweet, like a garden after a summer shower.

Nero blinks, shaking his head as if he’s trying to wake up from nodding off.

V says, “Truth that you bury will still grow. Even weeds spring up from the cracks in the sidewalk.” Then snaps his fingers. “Let’s hear the truth: how badly do you want to fuck me?”

The guy gets his movement back, opens his mouth and then whatever thing he was about to yell just cuts off behind the sound of him gagging. He stumbles back a step and hunches over to dry-heave loudly, all of his friends scattering back to avoid the mess. And then he _does_ throw up, but what lands on the floor is a bunch of kudzu.

V scoffs quietly. Then his head tips back and he laughs. Nero gets the perfect view of his pretty, inked throat but he almost forgets to even look because that guy just puked up _plants_.

The whole room just erupts after that. There’s shouts of surprise and outbursts of shrieking laughter and disbelief. People catch daffodils and daisies falling out of their mouths. One girl goes to pieces laughing and a confetti of peony petals sprays all over her lap. Another boy is pulling a vine of confederate jasmine from his lips.

V smiles at the guy still vomiting greenery on the ground.

“It’s alright, precious, plenty of people here agree with you,” he says airily. “I’m the most fuckable fag at this party.” He tosses his head when he turns and the rope of his braid flies over his shoulder as he strides through the disrupted chaos.

“Shit, that was somethin’!” Nico says, suddenly appearing at Nero’s side, her cheeks all rounded from grinning. “Here I was thinkin’ we should just ditch.”

“What the hell did I just watch?” Nero tries to say. He opens his mouth and gets half a syllable and a cascade of red camellias. They fall to the floor and Nero stares down at them. Nico’s smiles slips off.

“Aw, hell,” she says. Her hand snags Nero’s wrist and she drags him out of the room and into the backyard. Nero cusses but doesn’t get anything but more flowers. They land on the lawn between crumpled napkins and lost flip-flops and beer cans.

There’s a bonfire going and people playing loud music and dicking around by the pool but none of them look like they’re upchucking bouquets or hocking dandelion puffs onto the grass. 

“Shit, I don’t see him,” Nico sighs, coming down from her tiptoes. “Hey, you seen V come by here?” she asks a girl who’s sitting nearby on a plastic pool lounger, taking drags off a glass pipe.

“Oh, is he here?” the girl asks. 

“Dammit, nevermind,” Nico waves her off. She tugs Nero away until they hit a bit of fence that doesn’t have a crowd around it. “Well, you wanna try lookin’ back in the house?” Nico asks with a slant to her mouth. 

Nero isn’t exactly panicking (he’s had worse, much worse) but his perfect blissed-out drunk feeling is gone, a bit spoiled by the fact that opening his mouth makes flowers not words. He takes a deep breath and pulls out his phone to type instead. Nico must see the disgruntlement on his face because she starts filling his silence with explanation, watching him open his mouth every now and then to spit out blossoms.

“V does these like…party tricks sometimes,” she tells Nero while he types. “This one time, he was makin’ everyone speak in different languages dependin’ on how drunk they were. And you could only speak English if you were like…tipsy but not too drunk and if it got any worse, you’d just start yammerin’ in French or Chinese and it was weird but also really funny. All stopped by the next mornin’ once everyone was sober again.”

Nero frowns at Nico and holds up his phone to her.

_-who the hell is he?-_

“You heard about the campus witch, right?” Nico asks him. “That’s V, that’s him.”

Nero has never fucking heard of there even being such a thing as ‘the campus witch.’ But he sure as hell knows now. Tall and pale and almost sickly-thin. Graceful, though. Vengeful and exacting in a way that was kinda equal parts absurd but fascinating. Nero could almost admire it if he didn’t have petals sticking to his tonsils.

_-how do i make the flowers stop?-_

“I mean, it’ll probably stop on its own?” Nico says. “Or, if you want, we can keep lookin’ for him and ask him to help you uh…nip it in the bud.”

She beams at him. Nero flips her off but in spite of himself, a smile is stretching across his lips. 

“Come on!” she crows. “That was so good, I’m hilarious!” 

Nero laughs and Nico catches a handful of camellias and tosses them back at him.

They don’t find V but Nero just takes it in stride since like twenty other people of disparate genders are equally afflicted. He goes to bed trusting Nico’s word that things will go back to normal when he wakes up.

And then he wakes up the next day and when he yawns, a whole orb of blue hydrangeas swells out of his mouth like bubblegum.

* * *

It really is no wonder that Nero couldn’t find the guy: he didn’t think that the library was the place to look for a tatted-up, bisexual witch boy who apparently could be found at any party on campus but was never seen in anyone’s actual classes. But Nero figures that just says more about his complete disconnect with witches and bisexual boys, neither of which he’d ever hung out with before. Not for a lack of curiosity.

But Nico managed to hunt down one of V’s friends (the body shot girl, Nero thinks) and got some good info. So now Nero’s standing on the third floor of the largest library on campus, referencing the texted list of directions on his phone while he leaves a trail of hollyhock blossoms along his route.

 _-Turn left when you reach the shelf labeled 820.130 - 820.950 -_ it says and then tells him to _-Go down the row and then walk through the little gap between the shelf and the support beam and yes you DO have to do it like that-_

And Nero stares at the space that isn’t even a foot wide that he’s apparently expected to squeeze through, sighing so deeply that a giant magnolia flower flops pathetically to the floor between his feet. He tugs off his sling pack (that, thankfully, _isn’t_ stuffed full of textbooks today) and holds it in his hand while he shoves himself through, managing to knock out half a shelf of books by the time he makes it out the other side. Nero takes an extra eight minutes to put them back, frowning over the mysteries of the Dewey Decimal System, which he doesn’t know a damn thing about. At least the books all have numbers at the bottom of the spines. And then it’s alphabetical by author’s last name, right? He hasn’t got a clue, just a bunch of forget-me-nots to leave on the shelf after clicking his tongue and sighing over it all.

Nero keeps dogging the trail of bizarre instructions deep into the library. It’s uncomfortably quiet this far back; the ambient shuffle and pen-scratching of the students as they study at the tables close to the elevators doesn’t reach this far. The shelves tower over Nero’s head, high enough that he can’t reach the topmost. Stacked end-to-end, the books form a wall which blocks out all the sound that could reach him. 

_-Door should be straight ahead. Knock 3 times.-_

Nero picks up his head. There’s a dark wood door right in front of him with a white frosted window and a gold nameplate underneath it that has no name.

Even if Nero had found this place on a complete fluke, he never would’ve known to knock on this door. 

But he does knock – three times, as he was told – and about then, as he waits for an answer, Nero starts wondering why a student has an…office? in the library.

The door opens and it’s him. Black-haired and so pretty that it’s unreal. V stands there with his hand on the knob and raises his eyebrows when he catches sight of Nero. Then the surprise smoothly transitions to a swift but obvious once-over. A smile sneaks onto V’s lips.

“Well, then…. Hello,” V says softly. Nero swallows.

And then subsequently goes into a coughing fit. He turns away and covers his mouth but it’s not long before his hands are overflowing with a frankly outrageous amount of honeysuckle flowers and he can’t keep hold of them all. They twirl to the floor and scatter over Nero’s boots.

“Ah,” V says from over his shoulder; Nero’s still coughing blossoms. “You should come in,” V tells him and then turns inside, leaving the door open for Nero to follow.

The room inside is a cozy office space that has a desk with no computer but several piles of books. There are flowering plants on shelves and vines dripping out from hanging baskets and potted succulents lined up by the window that looks onto the campus green and all the students commuting and gathering there. There are colored glass mobiles and copper windchimes hanging from the ceiling.

“How long ago was that party?” V is asking as Nero looks around, curious and puzzled. “It’s been at least a week, hasn’t it?”

Nero turns to V and nods, coughing up another sweet, white blossom and just crushing it into his pocket. V smiles back, arms folded across his chest. 

“How interesting; that should have faded mere hours later,” he says. “Well, I suppose you’d like for me to get rid of it.” In answer, Nero opens his pack and pulls out a box of chocolates, holding it out to V.

“Oh!” V lights up, evidently not expecting for Nero to come bearing anything but gripes about his condition. “I see you came prepared. Spoke to someone who knows my favorites, did you?” 

Nero nods again and continues to offer the box since V hasn’t taken it yet. And he stands there, holding it a while yet because V is just watching him.

“It’s wise on your part to appeal to my hedonism rather than my compassion,” V observes. “Especially since my curiosity often outweighs my benevolence. I’ll take these and undo what my spell did to you, but I want one additional question to ask after the fact. Do you agree?” 

It’s a bit of a weird bargain to be making but it’s not like Nero has a problem with answering anything V wants to ask him. The better to have an excuse to just…talk to him. Maybe get to know a little more about this mysterious and (incredibly) attractive campus witch. 

Nero opens his mouth – not even thinking about it – and three big, pink roses tumble out, one after another. V smiles at him. The sort of smile that’s holding back delighted laughter. Chocolates and a question to stop this rather bizarre reminder that, yes, Nero thinks he’d like very much to fuck V. This is an easy deal. 

Nero nods. Then V holds out his hand and Nero shakes it. 

“We have an accord,” V says and _then_ he takes the chocolate box and puts it on his desk, lifting the lid to inspect the nine truffles inside. Not even looking at Nero, V’s hand glows gold from the lines of his tattoos and he snaps twice. “Truth be told; let secrets lie deep where they’re planted. There, try now.”

“Did it work?” Nero asks. “Oh, thank god.” He sighs and laughs in relief and no gardens come up because of it. Even the roses on the floor disappear.

“No, thank _me_ ,” V says, smiling with subtle satisfaction. It’s poised so quietly on his lips, like he’s got his own secret.

“Yeah, god, thank you,” Nero chuckles. “Didn’t really like the idea of this being my new normal.”

“Mmmh.” V leans casually against his desk and regards Nero in silence for a moment. “Now for my question,” he says after a beat.

“Yeah, sure,” Nero agrees easily. “Better now that I’m not gonna shower you in buttercups if I try to answer.”

“Indeed,” V says, a laugh touching the word as he says it. “May I have your name?” V asks.

Nero’s heart heats like a stone in the sun. When he smiles, V smiles back.

“It’s Nero,” he says. The slow nod V gives is like he understands so much more than just Nero’s name. That smile shows his teeth now. 

“Thank you, Nero,” V says. “Tell me what you think of me.”

Nero huffs a laugh. His words spill out like flowers.

“You’re the most beautiful person I’ve ever met,” Nero says without intending to. His hopeful happiness stutters as he locks eyes with V, who’s still smiling at him. On a gasp, Nero opens his mouth again and ends up saying, “Your attitude makes you seem like a cryptic jerk but I’m really into that and it only makes me want you more.” There’s laughter in V’s eyes. “Fuck!” Nero curses, his face and neck scorching hot with mortification. “When I saw you the first time, I thought to myself that I probably wasn’t as straight as I thought I was and it would be so good if I could just flirt with you a little and you liked it enough to flirt back!”

What the actual _fuck?_

“Do go on, Nero,” V says languidly. He chooses one of the truffles from the box and closes his smiling lips around a bite. Nero’s taken right back to the sight of him biting that lime out of the girl’s mouth, thinking about V’s teeth scraping against his lips. “You say such sweet things; I’m absolutely enchanted.”

Nero clenches his hands hard and then feels some invisible thread snap.

“No, what the hell did you—?” Nero gapes at V, who’s frowning at him now, eyebrows raised.

‘May I have your name?’ he had asked.

“Oh, hell, you’re not a witch,” Nero groans. “You’re a fucking _fae_.”

There’s a change in V. His shoulders pull back and his chin lifts until he’s looking down his nose at Nero. His eyes flash, pupils like pinpoints.

“What does that make you, I wonder,” V says, every word spoken with a glimpse of his teeth. They look sharper than before. “You, who severed my Ownership at will…. Never have I seen that in my life.”

“Yeah, I’m full of surprises,” Nero says, smirking in the face of fury. He shifts his weight onto his back foot and tucks his thumbs into his front pockets, not daring to look away. Backing down now would just get him in trouble. That, and Nero’s never been one to back down anyway. Even if looking into V’s eyes is a new flavor of bravery or dumbassery. Don’t matter. V could pull back his lips and bite and Nero would probably just end up with an unfortunate new kink, for all he knows. 

“I apologize,” V suddenly says, crisply, like a pair of silver scissors snipping right through the taught-pulled tension. Nero’s left there, rebalancing, bewildered. “I’ve been making playthings of mortals for so long, I had forgotten that my wanton curiosity might end up paying insult to another of the Veil.”

Nero runs his tongue along his teeth behind his pursed lips. Trouble is that V is really only apologizing because he didn’t get away with his plans. Or, at least, he didn’t for long. Fucking fae…. He’s so beautiful and Nero’s a goddamn idiot because he’s not taking this opportunity to leave while he has it.

“It’s fine,” Nero tells V with an easy shrug. “No harm done.” Like being forced to confess things he hadn’t yet put to words himself wasn’t completely humiliating.

“Then, I’m glad,” V says. Even if it’s not plain on his mouth, V’s eyes are smiling again, sweet as honey, and Nero is thriving for it. “Your blood is unfamiliar. I couldn’t fathom it at a glance or from the mere scent of you.” V pushes up from the desk and steps closer. “I haven’t encountered your clan before.”

“Makes sense,” Nero says. “Don’t exactly have the most extensive family tree.”

V circles Nero slowly, eyes following every line but apparently not drawing any satisfying conclusions. Except maybe whatever makes that sly smile return, the one V was wearing when he first opened the door and found Nero standing there.

“Won’t you tell me?” V asks when he’s before Nero again. “What do they call your kind?”

“You wanna know?” Nero asks. 

“Indulge me, won’t you?”

Nero is definitely inclined to indulge V, particularly since he’s standing so near. Near enough to smell. Like dark chocolate and ink rubbed from a stone. Bittersweet rain and earth and shadow. 

“I’ll trade you for it,” Nero says, grinning. V laughs and his breath tickles Nero’s cheek. 

“Are you certain you’d like to play a game of debts with me?” he asks. 

“I’ll tell you what I am,” Nero says. It’s not like Nero went out of his way to keep it a secret but V seems keen on knowing this one. Any way Nero can keep him interested…. “You said yourself you’ve never met anyone like me. You can spend your time trying to find the answer yourself if you want. And I’m sure you’re a patient and resourceful guy, so you’d probably get what you wanted eventually.”

V’s chin lifts just a fraction at the praise. Haughty creatures, the fae. Narcissistic and deservedly vain. Nero manages to catch V’s fingers gently in his own.

“Or,” Nero says, “You let me kiss you. Right now.” Nero’s heart leaps at the way V’s pupils blow wide with interest. “And I’ll whisper it to you.”

“Well,” V says as his uncaptured hand comes to rest on Nero’s forearm, grasping gently, “I am rather busy lately.”

“Mm-hm,” Nero agrees, smiling at V’s dark green eyes. They’re shot through with threads of gold. Nero’s heartbeat thuds heavily against his sternum and he lays his hand on V’s waist.

“Very well,” V murmurs, “I’ll take your trade: the truth for a kiss.”

They don’t shake hands but Nero laces his fingers through V’s and V grips him in return. 

“Sounds good,” Nero says.

V doesn’t close his eyes but watches Nero with his eyelids low and Nero just focuses on those pink, parted lips. Close enough to scent the springtime warmth of V’s skin, Nero kisses chastely but sure as hell savors the silkiness and heat of that sweet mouth on his. V’s whole body hitches and when the kiss breaks, a moan flutters from his lips against Nero’s. Nero skims the tip of his nose along V’s cheek and he anchors his hand – fingers spread – against V’s lower back. V begins to tremble right as Nero takes a soft, shallow breath and whispers,

“Incubus.”

**Author's Note:**

> hahahahaha yes i know it's all very silly but you know what i had a blast writing this and i'm not even remotely sorry. To those of you wondering if Spite the Grave is going to see an update anytime soon, the answer is Yes, Yes It Is, It Will Be Updated This Month (August 2020). I will have the new chapter for you very soon! Thank you for hanging in there!
> 
> If you liked the fic and wanna give me some support by leaving a comment (it makes my day hearing from you, it really does) but don't know what to say, please give me some squids! くコ:彡 Squid squad, ride or die. <3 You can also come check out [my tumblr](https://rednaelo.tumblr.com) if you like. Though I haven't been active there lately (due to ennui) I'm lollygagging around there daily and you can feel free to follow, send me asks, or even prompt requests! I can't promise I'll fill every prompt but I at least will look at them and offer thoughts!
> 
> Thank you guys so much. Be good to yourself while you're trying to find your new normal. <3


End file.
